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Stephen Holden

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Traffic (2000) 93% EDIT “Steven Soderbergh's great, despairing squall of a film, Traffic, may be the first Hollywood movie since Robert Altman's Nashville to infuse epic cinematic form with jittery new rhythms and a fresh, acid-washed palette.” – New York Times Sep 8, 2023 Full Review Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland (1992) 55% EDIT “As animated fairy tales go, Little Nemo is remarkable not only for the elegance of its pictorial design, but also for the calm benignity of its mood. ” – New York Times Mar 7, 2023 Full Review Eve's Bayou (1997) 83% EDIT “Jackson has never played a character quite this avid. And in a performance that requires him to infuse the role of perfect father and dream lover with a demonic charge, Jackson makes Louis at once irresistibly lovable and slightly terrifying.” – New York Times Jan 10, 2023 Full Review Down in the Delta (1998) 76% EDIT “The movie, which often threatens to disappear into a tub of soapsuds, is elevated immeasurably by the calm, stately performances of Mary Alice and Mr. Freeman. These two fine actors lend their roles a gravity, balance and underlying sense of sorrow.” – New York Times Jan 4, 2023 Full Review Dingo (1991) 80% EDIT “Despite strong, volatile performances by Mr. Friels and Ms. Buday, neither half of the story ultimately gets its due.” – New York Times Apr 13, 2022 Full Review Thousand Pieces of Gold (1990) 88% EDIT “Although the film contains many scenes that could have been directed for excruciating suspense or for tears, its tone remains objective to the point of detachment. That tone is set by Rosalind Chao's impressive, understated portrayal of Lalu.” – New York Times Feb 15, 2022 Full Review Frozen Assets (1992) 0% EDIT “It is the sort of frantic comedy that builds up a certain maniacal energy by trying to top itself in bad taste and ludicrous plot twists every few minutes.” – New York Times Aug 13, 2021 Full Review The Runner (1984) 100% EDIT “If The Runner is tentatively optimistic, it is also drenched in a mood of yearning lyricism.” – New York Times Jul 21, 2021 Full Review The Devil Never Sleeps (1994) 80% EDIT “Although the concept is promising, the movie's conclusions are too vague and scattered for her spadework to dig up a compelling drama.” – New York Times Dec 15, 2020 Full Review Coming Out Under Fire (1994) 91% EDIT “[Many] personal testimonies are skillfully woven into an absorbing portrait of 1940's military life that brings in Army training films, newsreels and period documents.” – New York Times Jun 8, 2020 Full Review The Air I Breathe (2007) 11% EDIT “"The Air I Breathe" ultimately registers as a gangster movie with delusions of grandeur.” – New York Times Apr 30, 2020 Full Review War Party (1989) 0% EDIT “The movie isn't so much dumb as it is irresponsible.” – New York Times Oct 29, 2019 Full Review Plácido (1961) 100% EDIT “The film offers a scabrously mocking portrait of officialdom putting on a display that is as grotesque as it is hypocritical.” – New York Times Sep 10, 2019 Full Review Welcome Mr. Marshall (1953) EDIT “The perfectly controlled tone of the performances is one of subdued farce with the faintest undercurrent of bittersweetness.” – New York Times Sep 10, 2019 Full Review Dead Man (1995) 69% EDIT “When Dead Man is imagining the Wild West as an infernal landscape of death, it is furiously alive. When it tries to reflect on those images, it begins to nod out.” – New York Times Nov 9, 2018 Full Review EDIT “Overacted, underwritten, murky (some scenes appear to have been filmed by candelight) and essentially implausible, it succeeds only in churning up an atmosphere of ghoulish sentimentality.” – New York Times Jul 5, 2018 Full Review The Zookeeper's Wife (2017) 64% EDIT “A polite but pallid recycling of Holocaust movie tropes with epic pretensions.” – New York Times Mar 29, 2017 Full Review Cézanne and I (2016) 52% EDIT “"Czanne et Moi" offers a pungent, demystifying portrait of the rowdy late-19th-century Parisian art world where famous painters and poets mingled and jostled for position at dinner parties and art openings filled with shoptalk, backbiting and intrigue.” – New York Times Mar 29, 2017 Full Review Frantz (2016) 91% EDIT “As if shedding a skin, the film shucks off its elegiac, white-gloved manners to explore a slippery realm of secrets, lies and moral uncertainty that eventually leads her to consult a priest for advice on how to proceed.” – New York Times Mar 14, 2017 Full Review Donald Cried (2016) 89% EDIT “The movie forcefully reminds you that the past you thought you had left behind still hurts, and that the old wounds you imagined had healed have simply been covered over.” – New York Times Mar 2, 2017 Full Review Apprentice (2016) 85% EDIT “At first "Apprentice" seems to be a basic revenge film in which Aiman stalks the man who killed his father. But it becomes psychologically more complex ...” – New York Times Mar 2, 2017 Full Review Dying Laughing (2016) 86% EDIT “Pared down, this overcrowded movie could be a teaching tool in a comedy school. But as one comic after another recalls triumphs, misadventures and painful lessons learned, the stories become redundant.” – New York Times Feb 23, 2017 Full Review Punching Henry (2016) 75% EDIT “Mr. Phillips's self-deprecating humor is amusing but not funny enough to give him the edge he needs to rise up and conquer.” – New York Times Feb 23, 2017 Full Review From Nowhere (2016) 92% EDIT “It's one thing to read about roundups of suspected illegal immigrants; it's quite another to observe the anxiety of smart, talented teenagers trying to keep their cool while under the watchful gaze of immigration officials and the police.” – New York Times Feb 16, 2017 Full Review Lovesong (2016) 83% EDIT “Little is resolved, and it will leave you contemplating the mysteries of relationships.” – New York Times Feb 16, 2017 Full Review
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